Well, two things, first yes, every piece of terrain on the board was water and I wasn't playing a master player. I'll get back to that in a second, because it is important.

However. Under the circumstances I laid out, Erin had less than a 50% chance of a perfect happy ending. Erin would need to break away (2/3) and _not_ fail a heat sink overload (also 2/3) for a happy endings odd of 4/9. 1/9 of the time she'd fail the breakaway and fail the heat sink check and there are various other permutations of odds I'm not going to go into. And then, of course, there was the problem of Daani, Colin and free shots on Erin once she got into the water with a token and her third click of heat.

Now, back to the player. I was playing at the venue that, right now, is the most successful one I play at. Over half of the players there are under 15. Of those, all play faction pure. All of them have what I consider to be a woefully small collection of units. All of them started playing in the last six months or so. Of the remaining players that have lots of experience or are older, all play fac pure (Bannson, Highlander, Republican and Swordsworn). When I play there I play armies like 3 DF Ullers and 6 LI ATVs or fac pure. Not stuff I'd bring to Nationals or anything like that.

Bringing this allllllll back to the original post, those kids are looking forward to the new stuff. And they all are desperately collecting big mechs. The Erin Johnston I faced was a birthday present and actually did the kid well: he won his first fight with her. These kids are either never going to deal with 'real' mechwarrior or if they do, there's a real chance they'll get discouraged and walk away. I think WizKids needs to make the rules to help new players, and I don't mean set retirement either. That's my story and I'm sticking to it. :)

Well I do agree MW is losing a little bit of steam. Even the new change of adding le prizes figures to boosters, which I support, is almost but not quite enough to get me to buy cases anymore.

I already have loads of useless figures. Falcon's prey is likely to make them even more useless. I hate this new practice of issuing uber powerd figures that totally obsolete previous figures. They should issue figures that enhance previous figures. Though I guess this is not possible since they're not adding new game mechanics.

Mage Knight on the other hand, seems to be going in the right direction. With all the new mechanics coming out in sorcery, there's enough flexibity to use older figures in different combinations. I think Sorcery will help eliminate the archtype army stye gameplay. There will be so many different combinations of spells, relics, domains, terrain, and figures It'll be difficult to come up with the arche type army so prevalent in MW.

I was talking about killing the infantry after breaking into water. I should have gone B then A, which would have made more sense.

In any case, Firstly, Erin Should have been able to wander into water on turn 1, and dominate from there out. Secondly, the kid with Erin SHOULD have had enough infantry to tie up your mechs to eliminate free shots while cooling in the water if needed.

Erin going into water is a good move... but not good enough. Remember, this isn't MW KING! I'm playing, it's just a kid. Sometimes they screw up. Also, he literally does not have enough infantry to make a decent army. I wish I was making this up.

My main point in all this is not to say 'lo, I am der UBER!' or suchlike, but just to point out how terrifically vulnerable mechs are. They have an awesome point cost and they look really really neat... but they ain't worth their points.

Right now it is easy to win without mechs and harder (not impossible, harder) to win with mechs (and even then, only certain mechs). IMHO, for the good of the game, it should be the other way around. You should be able to take a mech and assume that it will be a stunningly effective piece. The strategy boards here, IMHO, should be dedicated to 'how do I take down mechs' akin to 'how do I take out Kava'. Good players should be able to use a sophisticated combined arms approach to have some greater success, but a mech should, again, my opinion, be enough to make everything take note and not because it's easy points.

This will make it easier for new players to get into it (take one mech, assemble some support, get ready to rumble) and help keep disappointment down (since most new players do take one mech, assemble force, get ready to rumble and get smacked with tank drop/VTOLs/VTOL tank drops).

My belief that the game is dying still stands. But thats a personal thing.


Mechs for the most part do suck. As to wanting no one to field anything but mechs, not once did I even imply that. Hell, read my sig.

Actually, I want to clarify. Mechs do not suck. They simply are not worth their points. It is a smarter option to field 150 points of assorted VTOLS, Infantry, and/orArtillery than to field one mech. Why? Its harder to kill all those little things rather than focusing your guns on one big visable easy target.

Since I cant edit, let me just say that I dont believe that this game is dying, its more of a prediction based on what I have seen and heard.

This discussion of mechs power calls to mind a thread started by Ghost Bear 2K suggesting the possibility of a move to a 600pt/3 order format for the standard game.

It's really something to think about because it makes higher point units (i.e. Mechs) more order efficient, and lower point units (i.e. VTOLs, arty, etc.) much less efficient.

Food for thought.

(personal aside: if they do change to a 600pt/3 order format then the "fromage du jour" will probably turn out to be the command SE. Therefore, consider that, should a change of format be adopted, the command SE would/should probably be FAQ'ed to grant extra orders only on a 6.)

Actually, far as I can tell, it's that way _now_. Most armies I've seen posted in the build area have two and possibly up to five command rolls a turn and that's under the 450/3 rule.

The prize: HL Kodiak

Eight Players:
6-7 Mechs
17-19 VTOLs
and
2 Mechless Armies

Mechless army won

My mechless army lost to the other mechless army by four points in the second round.

Sigh...I just had to try it, the taboo of not playing mechs is gone.

For pennance I will play faction pure with minimum of two mechs for oh say until I get beat by another mechless army.

Mechless armies are so boring... Why play Mechwarrior when you leave mechs behind? You might as well go play another wargame then.

Thats pretty much how it is now. The problem is, you want to make it so newbies that are just joining the game have an equal chance of beating the vets? New players are getting turned off to the game because they are jumping right in to the competitive circuit, and they will keep losing no matter what rules change.

This game takes getting used to. Buying a couple of boosters and thinking you're ready to take on the world in a premier event is suicide not matter what :p

Maybe. But, look back over the whole Erin Johnston vs. ATV thread. Look at it and realize how much sophistication is needed to play Erin, as opposed to playing the ATVs. Yet Erin's vastly more expensive and, to the newbie, therefore useful, since they aren't wise to the way WizKids prices mechs in comparison to everyone else. (Plus Erin's cooler than ATVs.)

I want to reverse the sophistication. Mechs should be the dead easy pieces to play and the ATVs should be situational and tricky. So even if New Guy put out a bad army it would take effort on my part to take out Erin, not effort on his part to make sure she doesn't get totalled.

Yes, that would be ideal.

I had written a blurb to post on this thread, but why bother. I am getting out myself, the rules are wonky, Mechs by far are underpowered, and the laziness from which the designers make this game is disgusting. That is, taking rules from a fantasy based game of theirs, changing some wording, and using it for this game. Instead of say, using their creativity to make rules unique to this game. Obviously the units are 85% chaffe, 15% usable. As a collectible game, this is pathetic. The 15% are offered good amounts, you can get next to nothing for the rest. Magic for example, has a much better collectible value by far, than this game. Because even wonky cards can be used in some deck to good effect. Use the chaffe-y units in this game, and all you have is a really crappy army.

Mechless, factionless armies.. clumsy rules and movement.. I don't know, I am just tired of it. I probably will jump into CBT at some point, but this game has got me down. It just isn't worth my time and effort any longer. They slowly.. and I mean SLOWLY fix the rules of screwed up mechanics, and some are still not fixed. Charging at 2x? Yea.. that's fun and so realistic. -sigh-

Anyways, I'm sure there will continue to be people who play this game, it is a popular enough universe that probably sales will be enough to keep it afloat. Good luck to those who stay with it, keep pestering them for rule changes. One day, you may have a game whose rules the players are finally happy with! :)

fbf

What we need here on the Realms is a "Boot Hill" of sorts. A place for a player who've decided to leave the game to post one last time and write their own obituary. A tombstone icon could also be incorporated. A player who's decided to quit could change to the tmbstone, just let people know they've moved on and to look at Boot Hill for their finally resting place and last words.